Running Progress !

15 mile hill run round Parbold and Ashurst Beacon.
I took 2 mins off my course record from 3 weeks ago!
It felt good!
My aim for a peak at the end of August is looking good :0]

Two Runs A Day Challenge

I'm off work next week so I thought I'd challenge myself to running twice a day for the whole week!
Should boost my fitness a bit and remove a few more pounds of excess weight, I hope!
Ran well today over the big sand dunes, got into a nice groove with the legs turning over well :0]
Tess was doing good for the first hour, but suffered in the heat by the end.
May have to restrict her to shorter runs through the summer.

Exercise Each Day As If Your Life Depends On It!

Principles of Running, Don't Stop Till You Drop!

Hi Guys,
After two months of injury [torn Achilles tendon] I'm back!
Yeah!!!
As my friend Rob said never give up!
And here I am, ready to give it one more SHOT!
I followed my physio's instructions,
At first I didn't seem to be getting anywhere fast.
But I kept the faith!
And after weeks and weeks of painful jogging and walking my body suddenly recovered last week and I found myself pain free :0]
For me running has always been about the feeling of freedom, taking in the fresh air and enjoying nature, fast times and winning has always been of secondary importance!
Hell yes It's GOOD to be back!

WINTER SOLSTICE time to celebrate the return of the SUN!

Today the sun crossed the sky at its lowest trajectory as seen from the Northern Hemisphere, and so its apparent trek from rising to setting will be quick. Result: the shortest day of the year and the longest night.

On the bright side, starting Tomorrow the days will begin getting longer.

Where most of us live in the mid-latitudes, daylight ranges from about 15 hours around the summer solstice (when the Northern Hemisphere is tilted toward the sun) to around 9 hours close to the winter solstice. The opposite happens in the Southern Hemisphere, and as such, summer gets its official start there this week.

With less sunlight hitting us, temperatures drop. However, the Earth is actually closer to the sun during winter in the Northern Hemisphere. It's the tilt that gets us.

And in fact the coldest days of the year are yet to come. Though the days will get longer during January, Northern Hemisphere oceans continue to cool in the relative lack of sunlight, and ocean temperatures drive much of the weather on the continents. READ MORE

Top 10 Amazing Moon Facts

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No 'Dark Side'

Contrary to what you might have heard, there is no "dark side" of the moon. There is, however, a "far side" that we can't see from Earth. Here's why:

Long ago, the Earth's gravitational effects slowed the moon's rotation about its axis. Once the moon's rotation slowed enough to match its orbital period (the time it takes the moon to go around Earth) the effect stabilized.

So the moon goes around the Earth once and spins on its axis once, all in the same amount of time, and it shows us just one face the whole time.

Pagans celebrate the winter solstice, on December 21st
Christmas pagan? Do the celebration of December 25th, the Christmas tree, the giving of gifts and other Christmas traditions all have their root in the pagan mystery religions of the ancient? Or is all of this stuff about a "pagan Christmas" just a bunch of nonsense?
CHRISTMAS NOW

The celebration of the birth of commercialism.. CHRISTMAS PAST A holiday that originally was supposed to be for the birth of Christ. When the Catholics/ Christians took over the pagan peoples, they replaced their holiday with their own Birth of the Son, (as in of God) to make the transition to Christianity's traditions easier. The idea of Santa Claus and his reindeer was created in the 1800s, and is loosely based on St. Nicholas, who gave random presents to people. The idea of a christmas tree dates back to German celebrations of Christmas thousands of years ago. They used an evergreen tree to symbolize life and hope in dark times, and hung apples on it. THE ORGINAL CHRISTMAS A celebration of humanity dating back thousands of years. It originated as a pagan celebration of the birth of the Sun, as it was celebrated on the winter equinox, and after that point, days got longer.

The Spirit of the Marathon

NAUGHTY, NAUGHTY, VERY VERY NAUGHTY !!!
Tess and me headed out on a long one over the big sand dunes and through the pinewoods. We got stopped twice by rangers going through a private path inside the woods. Seem I need a pass from 'Natural England' who control the Ainsdale pinewoods, oh well :{ Finished with 3 hours and 1 min. Don't really like these slow runs but i know it will do me good in the end!

Ryan Hall, 'SPEED'@

TRAINING FOR THE WEEK
Wind and Rain, but hey lets look on the bright side at least it was warm :]
Sat 21st
Run with Paul around Parbold and Ashurst Beacon, lots of hills amd plenty of off rd running and mud -AWESOME!!! = 2.03
Fri 20th
Short run with Tess, felt 'good' = 24 min
Thur 19th
Long easy run with Tess over the big sandhills 'Lovin it' = 1.33
Wed 18th
MEGA SESSION
afternoon
run over sanddunes with tess plus Drills = 1.13
Evening
Club run, Hills plus finished off with 3 mile tempo run, hammered the last mile and 1/2 with wind behind me, 10-11 then 11.5 mph = 1.12
Tue 17th
Sandhills with Tess, easy = 1.04
Mon 16th
Club Session Fartlek, plus run down and back = 1.50

MY TRAINING FOR THE NEXT TWO WEEKS AND HOW MANY 'VIRGINS' ARE RUNNING THE LONDON MARATHON

Barry was quite interested to hear that I was running in the 'VIRGIN' London Marathon, he reckoned I'd have a good chance of winning, as there could not be many 'virgins' left in Britain!!!
Here is my training for the next 2 weeks to take me up to my target 10k [thanks Barry].

Training ---

MON --- J --- 1hr run with 10 x 100 mts sprints & 100 mt jogs between

TUE --- B -- 1 hour with light fartlek

WED --- L -- 200 mts and 3k T/Ts --with 5 mins between

THU --- W -- 45 mins jog

FRI -- O -- 10 x 100 mts fast strides with 300 mt jogs between

SAT --- L --- 5k T/T

SUN --- A/W -- 2hrs easy

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

MON --- H -- 16 x 45 mt dashes with 55mt jogs between

TUE --- B -- 45 mins with light fartlek

WED -- L -- 1600 mts --or 1 mile T/T

THU --- W -- 50 min jog

FRI --- Rest day

SAT --- A/W -- 20 mins + N -- 3 x 100 mt strides + 5 min jog .

SUN --- Race .

EPIC HILL RUN, EXTREME WEATHER AND A KNEE INJURY!

THE CHALLENGE, TWO FELL RACE ROUTES IN ONE AFTERNOON.
The plan was to run over both The Harrock Hill and Ashurst Beacon fell race routes, I set off with Paul in glorious sunshine and very warm conditions.
The first target was the quarry climb and the start of the Harrock hill race, after reaching the top we headed down through the fields, it started to spit light rain and by the time we got to the start of the climb up Ashurst Beacon the rain had become torrential, the road turned into a river within minutes as the water came gushing down. Near the top we took what had been a path to the Beacon it was now a fast moving stream, I half expected to see some fish swimming by!
Once at the Beacon the rain stopped and I decided to wring out my running vest, I must of got at least a pint of water out of it.
We then headed downhill on narrow lanes and then across farmers tracks flooded by the resent deluge, it was here I fell, crashing my knee into a rock. It was hard to see the damage at first as I was covered from head to toe in mud, this mud was not nice, god knows what it was made out of, but put it this way we were very close to a farm yard!
I picked myself up and limped onwards, within a couple of minutes we reached the Leeds- Liverpool canal which seemed like a good place to clean up my wound!
We crossed a bridge and with blood flowing down my shin I followed Paul up the steep quarry climb eventually coming out at the top by an ice cream van. No money for a 99 today so we crossed the road and headed over the tops of the fields to Harrock hill, after crossing the race finish line a got Paul to do one final climb up Hunters, I'm not to sure Paul was happy with subjecting his legs to more punishment but at least once over the top we had a long downhill over the fields to the car in Parbold.We finished the epic route dead on 2 hours, a great workout and well done to Paul for finishing his longest ever hill run and in such atrocious conditions.
The rain started again and by the time we were driving back it was absolutely lashing down!
I've not seen weather like this for a long time, it reminded me of the tropical downpours I'd seen in the Philippines!

LIVESTRONG.COM .SUPER COOL WEBSITE, training,fitness,injury treatment, and even Ryan Hall

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RYAN HALL VIDEO'S

THE SCIENCE BEHIND RUNNING THE SAHARA

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